Mpc 5000 pattern play?

Whats up all. I am new to the mpc scene and just bought a 5000 which will arrive in a few days.

I previously had a mv-8800 but needed 8 outs and was unable to find an output expansion after looking for it the last 4 months.

I decided to get rid of the mv and go for natives maschine when it is released, but in the mean time I,m using guru. But I NOW realize how much looser the latency is when sample sequencing in a computer so I decided to get an mpc 5000k.

I have never used an mpc and was wondering does it have a pattern play function? and how does it work?
The mv-8800 has a pattern play but its only a play from the start of the pattern and not play from current position
(example...Playing 4 measure pattern 1, switch to pattern 2 during measure 3, pattern 2 will play from its first measure instead of playing from measure 3)

The fantoms can play from current measure, software can and even a cheap Casio does, so i found it odd the mv couldn't.

So how does the mpc handle patterns or is it linear sequencing only?

Wel...you can record on 64 MIDI tracks. Then using Track Mute Mode, you can immediately Mute/Un-mute any of these tracks by hitting the pads. You can even perform DJ-styled beat juggling. These Mutes can be recorded in the sequence and played back.

I hope I answered your question.

all tracks start to play at the same moment in time however, they cannot have independent start control (nothing like ableton live where you can start clips independently from one another...)

i've only seen this happening on a genoqs octopus...
but this is an entirely other hardware sequencing environment, nothing to do with the mpc world...

it would be nice however to implement a kind of start function per track (track starts at 02.02.01 for instance) and to have independent track lenghts, and eventually independent track speeds (track 1 playing at 120 bpm, track 2 at 60bpm, etc...)
whishfull thinking of coarse...
let's have fun with the upcoming OS2 instead!

SuperKonquer - It has the same capability as Pattern Play by triggering a sequence from a pad but as Acoustiventure pointed they still start from the beginning.

Ok so it doesnt have real time groove switching but can be played pattern by pattern. Thnx for the info